The Astra-Șeșefschi was a two-seat

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

reconnaissance aircraft A reconnaissance aircraft (colloquially, a spy plane) is a military aircraft designed or adapted to perform aerial reconnaissance with roles including collection of imagery intelligence (including using Aerial photography, photography), signals ...

designed and built in 1923.

Design and development

The Astra Aircraft Factory was an aircraft manufacturer in Romania that operated from 1923 to 1925. The factory was created by the merging of the '' ro:Marta'' factory and the '' ro:Weitzer wagon'' factory. Astra-Șeșefschi, named after its designer, was a wholly Romanian designed aircraft apart from its engine. The Șeșefschi was an all-wood machine, like many in the 1920s but also because timber was then an important Romanian export. It was a single bay

biplane A biplane is a fixed-wing aircraft with two main wings stacked one above the other. The first powered, controlled aeroplane to fly, the Wright Flyer, used a biplane wing arrangement, as did many aircraft in the early years of aviation. While ...

with two- spar wings mounted with noticeable stagger and braced with a single, broad, forward-leaning

interplane strut In aeronautics, bracing comprises additional structural members which stiffen the functional airframe to give it rigidity and strength under load. Bracing may be applied both internally and externally, and may take the form of struts, which act in ...

on each side, assisted by wire cross-bracing. The upper wing was braced over the

fuselage The fuselage (; from the French language, French ''fuselé'' "spindle-shaped") is an aircraft's main body section. It holds Aircrew, crew, passengers, or cargo. In single-engine aircraft, it will usually contain an Aircraft engine, engine as wel ...

on two transverse, inverted-V

cabane struts In aeronautics, bracing comprises additional structural members which stiffen the functional airframe to give it rigidity and strength under load. Bracing may be applied both internally and externally, and may take the form of struts, which act in ...

and the lower one was mounted on the lower fuselage

longeron In engineering, a longeron or stringer is a load-bearing component of a framework. The term is commonly used in connection with aircraft fuselages and automobile chassis. Longerons are used in conjunction with stringers to form structural fram ...

s. Both wings were near-rectangular in plan apart from blunted tips but they were of different size, the lower smaller in both span and chord by about 15%. Unlike the upper wing, the lower one carried slight dihedral. Only the upper wing carried

ailerons An aileron (French for "little wing" or "fin") is a hinged flight control surface usually forming part of the trailing edge of each wing of a fixed-wing aircraft. Ailerons are used in pairs to control the aircraft in roll (or movement around ...

, which were short, reached to the wingtips and broadened as they did so. Martha-Benz engine

The biplane was powered by a 250 hp ''Marta-Benz'' engine, a six-cylinder, water-cooled, upright inline built at Astra. It was cooled with a pair of cylindrical Lamblin

radiator A radiator is a heat exchanger used to transfer thermal energy from one medium to another for the purpose of cooling and heating. The majority of radiators are constructed to function in cars, buildings, and electronics. A radiator is always a ...

s attached to the undercarriage legs. The tall

engine cowling An engine or motor is a machine designed to convert one or more forms of energy into mechanical energy. Available energy sources include potential energy (e.g. energy of the Earth's gravitational field as exploited in hydroelectric power gene ...

made the nose deep, but as it reduced rearwards into a rounded decking over a rectangular section structure the fuselage became more slender. Its pilot's

cockpit A cockpit or flight deck is the area, on the front part of an aircraft, spacecraft, or submersible, from which a pilot controls the vehicle. The cockpit of an aircraft contains flight instruments on an instrument panel, and the controls th ...

was just behind the wing

trailing edge The trailing edge of an aerodynamic surface such as a wing is its rear edge, where the airflow separated by the leading edge meets.Crane, Dale: ''Dictionary of Aeronautical Terms, third edition'', page 521. Aviation Supplies & Academics, 1997. ...

, which had a broad cut-out in it to improve his upward and forward field of view. Close behind there was a second cockpit for the observer. The pilot controlled a single, fixed machine gun firing through the propeller disc and the observer had a pair of guns on a flexible mount. He also had a radio and a camera. At the rear the triangular

fin A fin is a thin component or appendage attached to a larger body or structure. Fins typically function as foils that produce lift or thrust, or provide the ability to steer or stabilize motion while traveling in water, air, or other fluids. F ...

, built of

plywood Plywood is a composite material manufactured from thin layers, or "plies", of wood veneer that have been stacked and glued together. It is an engineered wood from the family of manufactured boards, which include plywood, medium-density fibreboa ...

, was an integral part of the fuselage and carried a generous, deep, rounded

rudder A rudder is a primary control surface used to steer a ship, boat, submarine, hovercraft, airship, or other vehicle that moves through a fluid medium (usually air or water). On an airplane, the rudder is used primarily to counter adverse yaw ...

. The Șeșefschi's horizontal tail was mounted on top of the fuselage. The angle of incidence of its triangular plan

tailplane A tailplane, also known as a horizontal stabilizer, is a small lift (force), lifting surface located on the tail (empennage) behind the main lifting surfaces of a fixed-wing aircraft as well as other non-fixed-wing aircraft such as helicopters ...

could be adjusted on the ground and split

elevators An elevator (American English) or lift (English in the Commonwealth of Nations, Commonwealth English) is a machine that vertically transports people or freight between levels. They are typically powered by electric motors that drive tracti ...

had a small, central gap to allow rudder movement. It had a simple, tailskid undercarriage with its mainwheels on a single axle, each end elastically sprung from a V-strut mounted on the lower longeron. The tailskid had its own

shock absorber A shock absorber or damper is a mechanical or hydraulics, hydraulic device designed to absorb and Damping ratio, damp shock (mechanics), shock impulses. It does this by converting the kinetic energy of the shock into another form of energy (typic ...

. The exact date of the first flight of the Șeșefschi is not known but it was reported as "just having made satisfactory tests" in September 1923.

Design and development

Specifications

References

Further reading